Countries are countries, not brands | Opinion | Marketing Week

The World Cup approaches and, once again, the English nation hopes against hope that it can win the tournament and finally end 44 years of hurt. Meanwhile, in South Africa the dreams are just as bold but aimed in a very different direction. FIFA's World Cup presents its hosts with, what they believe to be, their biggest ever opportunity to build a stronger country brand. That is a shame because, despite its growing popularity and firm establishment within marketing, the business of country branding or nation branding is nonsense. Countries are not brands. They are countries. Brand strategy should be reserved for brands. I may have a hammer, but it doesn't mean that every problem is shaped like a nail. Real expertise in a field is to know the limitations of that field and behave accordingly. I can appreciate the attractions of country branding. Selling a brand strategy to a public servant in Finland or Ghana must be a lot easier than pitching to a trained marketer from the likes of Unilever or Ford.

Click to read more ...

Strategy by Design and the Importance of Enterprise Architecture - Booz and Co

For years, many companies have experienced a problematic tension between their IT departments and business units. On the one hand, IT works best when it is tied tightly to the company’s overall business goals. That’s why chief information officers have long worked to get a seat at the executive table — to help set the company’s strategic mandate and align IT with the organization’s aspirations. On the other hand, business unit executives remain doubtful about IT’s ability to support them in creating value. And despite the best intentions of managers on both sides of this gap, companies continue to struggle to integrate IT systems and to determine whether IT actually improves performance, and if so, by how much.

Click to read more ...

90+ Essential Social Media Resources, the Best List of Social Media Tools Yet!! - Mashable

Now you’ve gone and done it. You’ve come across a list so enormous, so useful, and so awesome, our futile attempts to describe it have been lost in the tubes of cyberspace. We’ll just say this: No matter what you’re into — Twitter (Twitter), Facebook (Facebook), Mobile Apps, Business Development, or good-old-fashioned YouTube (YouTube) hilarity — you will find it below. So put down your barbeque, send out another huge thanks to our men and women in uniform, and limber up your scrolling finger — it’s a big one. If you dig the uber-list, be sure to send some comments our way down below!

Click to read more ...

Growth Through Focus - Less is More: A Blueprint for Driving Profitable Expansion: s+b

This strategy+business article is well research and offers a comparative view on the advantages of thinking about growth as focus rather than growth as more. Faced with economic headwinds, many global corporations are struggling to grow their businesses profitably. In the consumer packaged goods business, for example, the worldwide recession has hurt premium brands as consumers have traded down to cheaper brands, private labels, or generics. In the retailing business, same-store sales are flat or declining for numerous companies. Meanwhile, many business leaders continue to seek growth by extending their existing product lines and brands, as well as by entering new geographic regions. After all, growth is supposed to be about “more” — more products on the shelf, more categories, more brands, and more markets. However, this approach is exactly the opposite of what business leaders should do to drive increased revenues and profits. A typical “growth through more” strategy

Click to read more ...

Leadership, Thinking Ten Years Ahead - Imagining the Future of Leadership - Harvard Business Review

I'm convinced that — with new skills tuned to external future forces — leaders can make better organizations, better communities, and a better world. Ourlast big economic driver was engineering and the first stage of the digital age. At Institute for the Future, in our annual ten-year forecast program, we see an underlying shift to biology as a driver, and what I'm starting to think of as the "global well-being economy." If biology and the global well-being economy will drive the future, what does that suggest for leaders? How can leaders grow their own empathy with nature and the global well-being economy? Self-interest and competition will not be enough.

Click to read more ...